Can't Stop, Won't Stop

Senator Obama with Senator Claire McCaskill, left, of Missouri, and Gov. Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas on Tuesday in Kansas City, Mo. Mr. Obama received the endorsement of both women.
Three days after winning the South Carolina primary, forging a coalition of black and white voters, Mr. Obama selected this old oil town where his maternal grandfather was reared to open a weeklong tour of states holding primaries and caucuses Feb. 5. Mr. Obama conceded that he faces the urgent challenge of introducing himself to those who have paid only passing notice to the presidential race.

Yet Mr. Obama was not exactly coming home. He was raised in Hawaii, with pieces of his ancestry stretched around the globe, and he had never visited El Dorado before Tuesday. But without a childhood home in Kansas to establish his biography, Mr. Obama came here to link himself with a piece of faraway history in a state that just happens to be holding caucuses on the next stop of the Democratic nominating fight.

He collected an endorsement from Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who praised his “Midwestern values.” “He got them from his grandparents and his mother,” Ms. Sebelius added.